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OBJECTIVE: To examine whether highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) helps HIV-infected patients return to work, remain employed, and maintain hours of work. DATA SOURCE: Longitudinal data from a national probability sample of HIV+ patients older than 18 years old who made at least one visit in the contiguous United States in early 1996. STUDY DESIGN: The authors consider the effect of HAART on three employment outcomes: (1) returning to work within six months of treatment, conditional on not working pretreatment; (2) remaining employed within six months of treatment, conditional on working pretreatment; (3) hours of work conditional on working at the second follow-up survey. They use a bivariate probit model to jointly model employment and treatment with HAART for the first two outcomes and the two-stage least squares method for hours of work. State policies regarding prescription drug coverage are used as instrumental variables for HAART to account for a key source of potential bias - the more severely ill tend to have the most difficulty working, but are also the most likely to be on HAART. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Our results indicate that HAART increases the probability of remaining employed by HIV patients and hours of work for those working within six months of treatment. In the case of remaining employed, the employment effect (an increase from 58 percent to 94 percent in the probability of remaining employed) is statistically significant and the related incremental income is sizable compared to the incremental costs of HAART. Sensitivity analyses demonstrate that the results are robust to different specifications for insurance coverage. CONCLUSIONS: Patients who are working are more likely to remain employed because of treatment with HAART. HAART prescribed to patients in less advanced stages of the infection may lead to the greatest gain in employment.

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